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Lithuania: a legal requirement and a service database
The one country in the region where the law names the venues that must have a defibrillator. How the 112 centre and the emergency medical service work together, and how the device database reaches the dispatcher.
CPR in sixty seconds
- Unresponsive and not breathing normally? Gasping is not breathing. Treat it as a cardiac arrest.
- Call 112 (113 in Norway). Speaker on, phone on the floor. Stay on the line — the dispatcher will coach you.
- Push hard and fast in the centre of the chest: 5–6 cm in an adult, 100–120 per minute, letting the chest come all the way back up.
- Send somebody else for a defibrillator. Do not go yourself unless it is seconds away. Keep compressing.
- Turn the device on and do what it says. It decides whether to shock. After a shock, go straight back to compressions.
This is a reference written for bystanders, not a diagnosis, a training course or medical advice. It cannot tell you what is wrong with a particular person, and it does not replace the dispatcher on the other end of an emergency call — they can see what is near you and they will talk you through it. If you are worried about your own heart, or about a symptom, that is a conversation with a clinician rather than a page on a website.
One centre for all emergencies
Lithuania's 112 calls are answered by the Bendrasis pagalbos centras, the national emergency response centre, which takes calls for the ambulance service, fire and rescue, and police, and dispatches them. The medical response is provided by the emergency medical service, Greitoji medicinos pagalba. As elsewhere in the region, the dispatcher does not just take an address — they will talk a caller through chest compressions and stay on the line, which is the intervention with the largest measurable effect on bystander CPR rates anywhere it has been introduced.
A mandate, which is unusual here
Lithuania is the country in this region that has gone furthest in law. A health ministry order issued in 2019 requires automated external defibrillators in defined categories of public place — the sort of venues where large numbers of people gather. That is a genuinely different policy instrument from the voluntary, foundation-funded model used in the Nordic countries, and it means that in Lithuania the question for a venue operator is often compliance rather than goodwill. Check the current wording with the health ministry or your own legal adviser, because the categories and the details are the part that changes.
The database and how devices get into it
The emergency medical service maintains a database of automated external defibrillators, which has been extended and updated in cooperation with the health ministry, and dispatchers can direct a caller or a crew to a registered device. Public procurement, including EU-funded projects, has placed devices in municipal buildings, sports centres, bus stations and cultural centres across a large number of municipalities. Owners are asked to report their devices to the service so that the entry exists; as everywhere, an unreported device is invisible at the moment it matters.
What is still missing
Lithuania does not run a public volunteer-responder alerting scheme on the Danish or Swedish model, so the first responder in practice remains the bystander, the police or a rescue unit. And a legal mandate is only as good as its maintenance: a device installed to satisfy a rule in 2019 has had several pad and battery cycles since, and the enforcement of upkeep is the harder half of the policy. If you manage such a venue, the monthly check and the expiry calendar are the part that turns compliance into a working device.
If you are the one standing there
Call 112 and stay on the line. Speaker on, phone down, start compressions, and ask about a defibrillator — in a shopping centre, bus station, sports centre, cultural centre or municipal building the odds are better in Lithuania than in most of the region, precisely because of the mandate. Send somebody else to fetch it while you keep compressing.
| Item | How it works |
|---|---|
| Emergency number | 112 |
| Call centre | Bendrasis pagalbos centras |
| Medical response | Greitoji medicinos pagalba (emergency medical service) |
| Dispatcher CPR coaching | Yes |
| AED database | Maintained by the emergency medical service with the health ministry |
| Legal requirement | Health ministry order of 2019 for defined public places |
| Volunteer responder scheme | No nationwide public scheme |
| Open map layer | OpenStreetMap, emergency=defibrillator |
Sources: Bendrasis pagalbos centras (112 Lithuania) · Greitosios medicinos pagalbos tarnyba (Lithuanian emergency medical service) · OpenStreetMap tag emergency=defibrillator · checked 2026-09-08
Frequently asked questions
Are defibrillators compulsory in Lithuania?
In defined categories of public place, yes — a health ministry order from 2019 requires them where large numbers of people gather. The exact categories are the part to check with the ministry or a legal adviser before relying on it.
Is there a national defibrillator map?
The emergency medical service maintains a database that dispatchers use, developed with the health ministry. Owners are asked to report devices to the service. OpenStreetMap carries an openly licensed layer as well.
Who answers 112 in Lithuania?
The Bendrasis pagalbos centras, the national emergency response centre, which handles calls for ambulance, fire and rescue and police and dispatches the appropriate service.
Country by country
Estonia: 112, kiirabi and no national AED register
One number for everything, a dispatch centre that coaches CPR down the phone, and defibrillators scattered by municipalities, employers and shops with no single public list. What that means if you are the one calling.
Finland: defi.fi and the 112 Suomi app
The best-organised defibrillator register in the Baltic Sea region: a national database run by the heart association with the resuscitation council and the Red Cross, feeding device locations to the emergency services app.
Latvia: NMPD, 112 and a patchwork of devices
The state emergency medical service answers the medical side of 112 and publishes guidance for defibrillator owners, but there is no single public register. Where devices have actually appeared, and what to do with yours.
Sweden: a register, a research base and SMS lifesavers
A national defibrillator register run by the resuscitation council, a quality register that has published cardiac-arrest outcomes for decades, and a volunteer scheme that grew out of the research.
Norway: 113, NAKOS and the register that is free
The medical emergency number is 113, not 112. The national defibrillator register is run by a state competence centre and costs nothing — which matters, because commercial look-alikes have been invoicing device owners.
Everything on this subject
Before the emergency, there is a long quiet stretch
Blood pressure, resting heart rate, movement and sleep are the part of this you can act on for years beforehand. TempoLife keeps them in one place, free to start.